Despite such stark inequality, black and indigenous populations have not, until recently, mobilized along racial and ethnic lines for reform. For one thing, the idealization of mixed blood might have made minorities with lighter skin less willing to ally with their darker counterparts. Rather than fight for indigenous rights, for example, it was preferable for many to blend in as mestizos, especially because mestizos were afforded a higher social status as exemplars of the national ideal.

It was a late December evening and my mom had just arrived in Krakow, where I had been studying for the past three months. We were making our way from my apartment to where she was staying in the nearby city center.

As we approached the Main Square, a group of rowdy young men approached us.

It happened in a brief second, but their words were unmistakably clear.

“Ching-ching-chong.”

It lingered in the shadows of the street long after they disappeared down the road…